About Me

Monday, July 28, 2008

I've added a link to my favorite sites list. It goes to the new Carmelite Monastery in Wyoming, which celebrates the traditional Carmelite rite of the Mass. They live a cloistered life of prayer, interceding for a world that greatly needs it. From their site:

The Carmelite Monks are men who are consecrated to God through the Vows of Obedience, Chastity, and Poverty. They live a life of prayer, solitude, penance, and strict separation from the world. Their lives are completely dedicated to interceding for the Church and the world. St. Thérèse proclaimed the Carmelite vocation as being "love in the heart of the Church." As the heart circulates blood throughout the whole body, so the Carmelite is called to circulate grace throughout the Church. This is the essential meaning of the vocation of these cloistered monks.

Many of the greatest male monastic orders within the Church have lived strict monastic enclosure, such as the Carthusians, the Camaldolese, the Brigetines and certain reforms within the Benedictine Order. The Church has always upheld these expressions of male monasticism as a higher means to sanctification and as supremely beneficial to her mission in the world.

The Carmelite Monks have a profound love and respect for their monastic enclosure. Indeed, their form of monastic life is challenging and austere. With the exception of extern monks who are allowed to work outside the enclosure wall, the cloistered monks only pass through the gates of the monastery when there is an explicit permission from the Bishop, for medical needs or other serious reasons.

Many people see the cloistered religious life as formidable; however, the monks experience it as an entrance into a spiritual paradise. Many see it as a separation and an imprisonment; the monks see it as a means to union with God and the truest form of freedom. Ultimately, they have a profound conviction that they are the hidden leaven within the Church, empowering her through a life of prayer and sacrifice.

Deep in the hearts of these monks there is a profound loyalty to the Magisterium of the Church. Like their holy parents, St. Teresa and St. John of the Cross, they wish to always remain "loyal sons of the Church." They firmly embrace and accept each and every definition that has been set forth and declared by the unerring Magisterium of the Holy Catholic Church. They will forever remain firmly united to the Holy Father, the Supreme Pontiff and Shepherd of the Church of Jesus Christ, and the Bishops united to him. They are also determined to always remain in loyal obedience to their immediate shepherd, the Bishop of Cheyenne.

The Carmelite Monks adhere to all those principles set forth by the Church that determine and regulate an authentic religious life. As a sign of their consecration to God and the Blessed Virgin Mary, they will at all times wear the religious habit.

The monks are currently trying to raise funds for a 500 acre area in Wyoming that would well suit them for the contemplative life they seek. Donate here if you wish to get involved. And pray for them!